Flaming Hearts
by Candid Ishida
Summary: Taito/Yamachi Tai's strange dream predicts the loss of Matt's apartment in a fire. He loses his home but discovers Tai's secret desire to be with him. COMPLETED! Please review!!
1. Default Chapter

The petite, tan brunette who a moment ago had been sleeping soundly awoke from his dreams  
with a start. Still in a daze, and on the verge of tears, he reached behind him and blindly fumbled  
through the items on the computer desk for the phone. He dialed a number which he knew by heart  
and waited for an answer.  
"Hello...?" a groggy voice said from the other end.  
"Matt, is that you?"   
"Yeah it's me, who the hell is this?"  
"It's Tai, did I wake you up?" The little brunette's breaths were coming in gasps.  
"It's 3 o'clock in the morning on a school night, what do you think?"  
"Can you meet me at the park, please?" He sounded panicked, almost like he was begging.  
"What's the matter, did something happen to you?"  
"I had a bad dream, please Matt, I need to see you."  
"Are you crying?"  
"Just come, I'll make it up to you I promise."  
Matt groaned and sat up in his bed, the phone still pressed to his ear.  
"Fine, give me 15 minutes, I have to get dressed."  
"Ok." Tai sniffled slightly and hung up the phone. He raised himself out of bed and padded  
silently across the floor.  
  
Nearly 20 minutes later, Tai sat on a bench in Odaiba Park, fully dressed and wearing a light  
blue hooded jacket.  
"This better be good Yagami, waking me up at 3 am..." a voice said. He looked up and saw  
Matt step into the light of the street lamp and then sit beside him.  
"I'm sorry, I just needed to make sure you were alright," the smaller boy said softly.  
"Why wouldn't I be?"  
"I had a nightmare...I just got so scared." He paused for a moment and swallowed.  
"I dreamed your apartment building was on fire. I kept running around asking people if you  
were alright, but they were all people I didn't know. Nobody would answer me. Then I saw your  
mom, and she came up to me and told me you were dead. It was so real..."  
"But I don't even live with my mom."  
"I know, but it scared me so much. I thought you had really died..."  
Matt placed his hand on his friend's shoulder and leaned forward a bit to see his face. One hot  
tear ran down his peanut butter colored cheek and rolled off his chin. It fell until it landed on his pant  
leg.  
"Hey don't cry, I'm alright."  
Tai made a small hiccuping sound and began sobbing quietly. Matt pulled him closer and let  
his wild haired partner cry against his chest. Tai started to feel comforted by the warmth of Matt's  
body and pressed against him, making sure he was really there.  
A short time later, they still sat together on the bench, but Tai had calmed down by then.  
"Sorry for waking you up..." he said, staring at the side walk in front of them. He was leaned  
forward with his elbows resting on his knees and his fingers laced together.  
"Don't worry about it." Matt was leaned back against the bench with his arms folded and his  
legs crossed.   
They sat in silence for a moment until the sound of a siren attracted their attention.  
"Is that a fire truck?" Tai said, sitting up.  
Just then, a large fire truck with his lights flashing and its siren blaring sped by.  
"Yes, and it's heading towards my apartment building!" Matt stood up and Tai got to his feet  
along with him.  
"You don't think..."  
"Come on," Matt said urgently. They started running down the street and around the block,  
following the sound of the fire truck.  
  
In the crowd of people outside the blazing apartment building, Mr Ishida pushed through the  
mass confusion surrounding him on all sides, calling out his son's name,  
"MATT!" he yelled over and over. He tried asking neighbors he bumped into, but everyone  
was too busy searching for their own friends and family members.  
Mr Ishida finally made his way to a fireman, who was removing an axe from the side of one of  
the fire tucks.  
"Please, I need someone to help me find my son!" he yelled.  
The ash covered foreman ignored him at first and started to walk back towards the burning  
apartment complex.  
"Hey, I need some help here!" Mr Ishida shouted over all the noise. "He's a tall blonde boy,  
we live in apartment 202. I need to know if he got out!"  
The fireman just turned around for a moment and called back, "Sorry sir, but there are other  
people we need to get out of there." With that, he pushed through the frenzy and was gone.   
Matt and Tai ran around the bend and looked up to see the towering inferno that was once an  
apartment building.  
"This is unreal..." Matt said, almost in a whisper.  
"Matt, what about your dad!?" Tai said suddenly.  
"He was at a conference, his train doesn't get back until 4 am."  
"It's after four now," Tai stepped up closer to Matt's side.  
As they stared up at the huge mass of flames, they heard a husky male voice coming nearer.  
"MATT! Where are you!?" There was Mr Ishida making his way through the huge crowd  
towards them.  
"Dad!" Matt and Tai climbed over the safety fence that had been set up by the fire trucks  
where onlookers had begun to gather to see the spectacle and ran over. The tall thin blonde collided  
into his father's chest and felt his arms wrapping tightly around him.   
Mr Ishida finally let go of his son and checked over him to make sure he was undamaged.  
"Matt, what were you doing out here!?" He had to speak quite loudly to be heard over all the  
commotion.  
"I was with Tai at Odaiba Park," he said. Tai stepped up a little closer to his best friend and  
his father. "This is going to sound crazy, but Tai had a dream I died in a fire. If he hadn't called me,  
I'd probably be in there right now..." He gazed up at the window of their apartment, and all he could  
see was smoke billowing out and flames inside the glass door of the terrace.  
"My room..."  
"What's important is that you're all right," his father said. "We can always get a new  
apartment,"  
"My bass, my harmonica, my digivice, they're all up there..." he said, speaking more to himself  
than to his father or Tai.  
"We'll get your digivice back somehow Matt," Tai offered, trying to comfort him.  
"But my harmonica... I've had it since I was a little boy. It's probably nothing but a melted  
hunk of metal now."  
"Matt,"  
He turned to Tai and sighed, forgetting about his possessions and remembering his life had  
almost come to an end.  
"I don't know how it's possible, but you saved my life tonight..."  
"Maybe some part of me knew I wouldn't be able to live without you and I had that dream,"  
Tai said. He stepped forward into Matt's embrace and they stood holding each other. Tai's chocolate  
colored hair pressed lightly against the side of Matt's face. In the back of his mind, he thought how  
satisfying it felt to have another boy in his arms, especially this one.  
"Do you want to sleep over at my house tonight?" Tai asked when they had let go of each  
other.  
"Matt, you should go get some sleep," his father said. "I'm going to stay and find out what  
happened here and see if there's anything left to our apartment. We're probably going to be  
staying with your mother and brother until we can find another place to live."  
Matt nodded and took one last look at his smouldering apartment building.  
  
Tai opened the door cautiously and peeked inside, not making a sound.  
"Good, no one woke up. They don't know I was gone," he whispered. The two teenagers  
stepped inside and took off their shoes.  
"They're going to know you were gone when they find me here in the morning."  
"We'll explain everything tomorrow," he assured.  
They went into Tai's room, the door of which he closed behind him, making sure not to slam  
it.  
"Do you want to borrow something to sleep in?" Tai asked.  
"Sure."  
The brunette draped his jacket over a chair and switched on the desk lamp before thumbing  
through the closet.  
"Are sweat pants and a t-shirt ok?"  
"That's fine," Matt responded.  
"The pants are going to be a little short on you." Tai tossed a pair of sweat pants and a white  
cotton t-shirt over to his friend.   
When Matt pulled his turtleneck over his head, he saw Tai undressing and hanging his clothes  
over the back of the desk chair. He pulled his pants and underwear off together and for a moment  
the brown haired beauty was standing in just his socks with his back to Matt. He stared at the  
perfectly smooth, tan skin illuminated only by the dim light of the desk lamp. When he turned to the  
side to pull on a pair of boxers, Matt could see the gently rippling muscles on his abdomen. Although  
he was slim and petite, it seemed like every inch of his body was covered with well sculpted muscle.   
The young blonde could not deny how attractive the other boy was and quickly lowered his eyes and  
started changing before Tai noticed he had been staring. He tried to shake the image from his mind,  
telling himself that the trauma of seeing his home go up in smoke must be messing with his head.  
Tai glanced quickly at Matt's creamy white skin and slender frame while he undressed but  
turned away when he felt a blush creeping into his cheeks and blood rushing somewhere lower.  
"Where am I sleeping?" Matt asked when he was done changing.  
"Well, I think it would make too much noise if we tried to get the trundle bed out, so you can  
share my bed." Tai climbed into his bed and turned down the covers.  
"Inside or outside?" he asked.  
"Whichever side you don't usually sleep on."  
"Well duh Matt, I usually sleep in the middle since I'm the only one who uses this bed." Tai  
grinned and Matt smiled slightly.  
"Outside is fine."  
"Kay." Tai rolled over against the wall and made room for Matt to climb in next to him. They  
lied there for a few minutes and Matt was starting to doze off when Tai said,  
"It feels kind of nice having someone to share my bed with."  
Matt opened his eyes and looked over at Tai.  
"Tai, have you ever slept with anyone?" He said out of the blue. He immediately wondered  
what could have made him ask this question, when he knew very well that Tai hadn't, unless he was  
keeping secrets from him.  
"Yeah, I'm sleeping with you right now."  
Matt grumbled, "You know what I mean..."  
"No... have you?"  
"Not yet, but I've come close."  
"What do you mean you've come close?"  
"Well... you know, make out sessions that got pretty serious. But I've never actually..."  
"Yeah." Tai said, verifying that he understood, so Matt wouldn't have to say anything that  
made him uncomfortable.  
Matt stared into the huge cocoa colored pools looking back at him. He couldn't shake the image  
of Tai's gorgeous body from his mind. Without thinking, he tipped his head closer and kissed the  
other boy on the forehead. His skin was hot, it felt like his lips were burning.  
Matt pulled back and Tai reached up to touch his forehead in disbelief. It took several seconds  
to realize what he had done, and when it sunk in, he rolled over and got up out of the bed.  
"I'm sorry... I don't know what I was thinking." He reached for his clothes lying at the foot of  
the bed. "I'm just gonna go find my dad."  
"Matt wait, don't go... I love you."  
Matt's eyelids shot open suddenly and he gasped. His blue eyes darted back and forth for a  
second, trying to figure out where he was.  
There was Tai lying next to him, sound asleep.  
"It was just a dream..." He sat up and touched his lips, remembering what it had felt like to  
kiss the friend he had known since they were 11 years old. "Just a dream..."   
Matt felt an empty spot forming inside him. 


	2. Happily Ever After

A week later, Matt sat in the cafeteria of Odaiba high school with a book in his hand and his lunch on the table, which he naturally had cooked himself. He sipped at a can of soda while he read only glanced up when Sora and Izzy walked over and sat themselves down on the opposite side of the table.  
"Hi Matt," Sora said with a smile.  
"Hello, Matt, have you noticed that the humidity is 2.4 degress above the average for this time of year?" Izzy said as he sat down.  
"Um... yeah." Matt raised an eyebrow and set his book down on the table.  
Suddenly a bushy haired head leaned over him and took a big sip of his soda through the straw.  
"Tai! Get your own," he said, yanking it away.  
"Well hello to you too Mr. Sunshine," Tai said, grinning and sitting down next to him.  
"What are you having for lunch today, Tai?" Sora asked. She and Izzy both had trays with school lunches before them.  
"Oh... My mom made my lunch," he said, opening a box full of something that resembled food on the table.  
"You can have some of mine Tai, i always pack too much anyway." (A/N: Sailor Moon reference!! heehehehe, anyway)  
"Hey, thanks Matt!"   
Matt picked up a piece of fish with his chopsticks, expecting Tai to help himself, but he noticed the brunette boy was leaning over with his mouth wide open. Matt stared at him for a moment and then smiled.  
"Here comes the airplane!" Matt said, shoving the food into Tai's mouth. He grinned and giggled and in a few minutes he had eaten half of Matt's lunch.  
Tai looked up at the clock soon after and stood up.  
"Sorry to leave but i have to go make up a test. See you guys later!"  
"Ok," Sora said.  
"See ya," Matt replied, going back to his book. Izzy was typing away on his laptop and appeared to be quite hypnotized.  
"Matt, are we still meeting after school?" Tai asked before he turned to go.  
"Yeah, I'll see you then."  
"Ok, bye for now!" He called over his shoulder as he hurried out of the room.  
Izzy looked up from his laptop and Sora stared at Matt. Feeling the two sets of eyes upon him he lifted his head.  
"What?"  
"Are you two dating?" Sora asked.  
"What!?" Matt nearly dropped his book onto the floor.  
"Well, it seems like you've been flirting a lot lately," Sora remarked.  
"You have been spending a considerable amount of time in each other's company," Izzy added matter-of-factly.  
Matt thought for a second before answering. Tai had been awfully clingy lately, but he enjoyed being with him so much he hadn't even stopped to notice how often the pair were seeing each other. He wondered if it would really be so terrible if they were together, but someone like him could never feel that way, or so he tried to convince himself.  
"No, we're not dating," Matt said, and ended the conversation by getting up and leaving the lunch table, book in hand.  
  
After school, Matt waited outside the front doors with his bag slung over his shoulder, waiting for Tai.  
"I wish he wasn't always late..." the blonde mumbled. He gasped with surprise as he felt another body hit him in the back and saw two arms swing around him.  
"Sorry I'm late!" a cheerful voice said from behind. Matt shrugged him off and turned around.  
"Don't do that..."  
"What? Hug you?"  
"Yes." Matt started walking down the sidewalk away from the school. The shorter boy followed behind him.  
"Why not?"  
"Because, people think we're dating. You've been hanging all over me lately."  
Matt walked a few more steps and realized Tai had stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. All he could see was Tai's mass of chestnut hair, he had his head hung and was looking at the ground.  
"What's the matter? Are you feeling sick or something?"  
"Why is it so bad if they think that..." Matt could barely hear him, he was speaking so low.  
"What are you talking about?"  
Tai looked up again and Matt saw tears streaming down his friend's cheeks. It was strange for this to come on so suddenly, because Tai really didn't cry very often.  
Matt hurried back to him and placed a hand on his trembling shoulder.  
"Tai, what's the matter?"  
"Why do you think it's bad... if people think that." he managed to get out between sobs.  
"You mean that we're dating?"  
Tai only nodded.  
"You mean you..." Matt thought back on everything that had happened over the past week. Tai had been asking him to come over nearly every day. He had simply assumed Tai was trying to comfort him after losing his apartment, but it was more than that. Had Tai always looked at him that way?  
"I had a feeling..."  
"That I liked you?" Tai asked. He sounded so small.  
"I had a dream that I kissed you when i was sleeping at your house, the night my apartment building burned down."  
"So that's what you were dreaming about..." he said.  
"Was i talking in my sleep?" Matt asked, wondering how he knew.  
"No... after you fell asleep you kind of got an uh... well, I could tell you were having kind of an arousing dream... You know what i mean?"  
Matt blushed slightly when he figured out what Tai meant.  
"Matt, I'm sorry... I can't help the way i feel about you..."   
Matt could see his lip was starting to quiver slightly. Knowing he was about to cry again, Matt wrapped his arms around the beautiful little brunette and held him closely.  
While this was going on, Sora and Izzy were walking out of the school together. They strolled along the sidewalk talking until Sora glanced over and noticed the two boys a dozen or so meters away.  
"Look!" she exclaimed, pointing and almost hitting Izzy in the face. They both gaped at the two teenagers hugging each other in the middle of the sidewalk. They were holding each other so tightly it looked like they were literally joined at the hip.  
"Didn't a certain someone just inform us that they WEREN'T dating?" Izzy said.  
"They're crazy..."  
Izzy nodded in agreement.  
"They also in love with each other," Sora mused. "I just think they're the only ones who don't know it yet."  
  
The small cocoa haired brunette sat shivering on the bleachers next to his blue eyed friend the following Saturday. He wrapped his bare arms around his body, trying to keep warm in his thin t-shirt. The middle school soccer team had made it to the playoffs and most of the digidestined had come to watch Davis play. They were all sitting in different spots however, in groups of two or three, since seating was scarce at such an important game.  
"Are you cold?" Matt asked.  
"Yes, that's why I'm shivering like crazy," he replied, glaring to his right at the tall blonde.  
"Why didn't you wear a jacket?"  
"Because I didn't know it was going to be so cold!" he whined.  
"Come here." Matt extended his arm and Tai inched over until he was pressed up against Matt's chest and the arm, clothed by a thick black sweater, was wrapped around him.  
"They say body heat is the best way to keep warm," Matt said, smiling.  
Tai nuzzled up against Matt's body and could feel his heart beating. The warmth started to flow through him and soon he felt like he was surrounded by a comfortable blanket.  
"Matt, have things changed between us?" he asked.  
"Of course they have. Things change between people all the time, but that doesn't mean they can't still be friends." He paused for a moment and looked off into the distance, then continued. "Sometimes change even makes things better."  
Tai thought for a moment, going over everything in his head.  
"I want to be more than friends..."  
"I'm not sure that's right for me, Tai."  
The brown eyed boy shifted and looked up at Matt.  
"Well look what we're doing right now, does this feel wrong?"  
Matt didn't move but said in a barely audible voice," No..."  
"And when we slept in the same bed, was that wrong?"  
Matt said nothing this time, but Tai could tell by his facial expression that the answer was still No.  
"And... would it feel wrong if I did this?" Tai slowly moved his face closer and tipped his head to the side. They moved together until they could feel each other's hot breaths blowing against their cheeks. Finally, Tai's creamy tan lips touched Matt's milky white ones and they molded together.  
On the soccer field directly in front of them, Davis was dribbling down the turf, about to make the goal that would tie the game in the last few minutes of the first half. He glanced for a split second at the bleachers, but suddenly did a double take at the sight of Matt and Tai in a lip lock and tripped over his own foot, landing face first against the half frozen ground.  
The referee's whistle blew and the Odaiba coach called Time. The coach and several players ran over to their fallen team mate.  
"What the heck happened, Motomiya?" the coach asked him, Davis got to his knees slowly and cupped his hand under his nose.  
"I think I broke my face," he graoned.  
"Your nose is bleeding pretty bad." The coach then called over to a boy still waiting on the bench. "Hino! Come over here and fill in for Motomiya!" The boy ran out to the field and Davis trudged back to the bench for a tissue and ice pack.  
When the game resumed and Davis had controlled his bleeding, he started motioning for his two older friends to come over. Matt and Tai's kiss had been broken due to all the commotion, and they now pushed past the people in front of them until they were at ground level.  
"Davis, what happened to you out there?" Tai asked when they reached him.  
"Well if you saw one of your best friends kissin' another one of your best friends, wouldn't you be a little SURPRISED!?" he shouted.  
Tai opened his mouth to reply, but Matt spoke before he was able.  
"Davis, it's none of your business," he said simply, and started to walk away.  
"Matt, wait!" They left the soccer game and started down the sidewalk, passing Odaiba park on the way.  
"I guess we can forget out keeping any of this a secret even if we wanted to," Matt said, sounding slightly annoyed.  
"Huh?"  
"Well now that Davis has seen all that, we can count on every one of our friends knowing by tomorrow morning."  
"Davis does have kind of a big mouth, Tai said jokingly.  
"Matt," he added, growing serious, "are you mad at me?"  
"Why would I be?" They both continued to walk.  
"I mean... did you enjoy that?"  
Suddenly, Matt looked up and down the street to see if any people were coming and grabbed Tai's hand. He ran off the sidewalk onto the grass of the park, Tai stumbling along behind him. When they had reached a small clump of trees, blocked from view by a tall hedge, Matt pressed Tai up against a tree in the corner.  
He held the back of Tai's head in his hand and touched his lips to the smaller boy's, plunging his tongue into Tai's warm mouth. When Matt's lips overtook him, the little brunette felt a searing hotness and opened his jaw wider to receive the kiss. Both tongues probed back and forth, and every time Matt started to close his mouth, Tai would open it again with his own, pleading for more.  
They tasted and kissed each other for what seemed like hours, when in reality it was only a few short minutes. Matt finally pulled away from his best friend, panting.  
"Now, you can't tell me you didn't want that..." Tai said breathlessly.  
Matt smirked and wrapped his arms tightly around Tai's narrow shoulders.  
"It was better than any dream, that's for sure."  
"Matt I love you."  
"I know."  
Tai placed both hands on Matt's chest and pushed him away a bit.  
"Is that all you have to say?"  
"I think you know already that I love you too..."  
Tai brushed Matt's silky hair out of his eyes, his fingers grazing gently against the blonde's forehead. Matt brought his delicate hand to the side of Tai's perfectly pure face and touched noses with him.  
"How long do you think we would have gone on pretending we didn't feel this way, if it hadn't been for that dream I had?"  
"I don't know," Matt replied, his lips almost meeting Tai's when he spoke, "all I know is that when I'm with you my heart's on fire..."  
They pulled close until their flaming hearts were beating against each other, and never let go again.  
  
(A/N: And they lived happily ever after! *flashes a cheap-ass grin*) 


End file.
